


Better To Be Somebody Else

by Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye)



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-24
Updated: 2011-01-24
Packaged: 2017-10-15 01:37:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/155657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eustaciavye/pseuds/Eustacia%20Vye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I find sometimes it's easy to be myself<br/>Sometimes I find it's better to be somebody else</p><p>For the inception_kink prompt: <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/13659.html?thread=30191963#t30191963">Whoever is dating Arthur is getting really frustrated, because he's so cold and not at all affectionate in public.</a> Title and summary from Dave Matthews Band's "So Much To Say."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Better To Be Somebody Else

Things started slowly after the Fischer job. Ariadne had school to finish, and the team had to lie low for a bit. Arthur came around to visit Ariadne in the weeks in between, talking about random, inconsequential things. Ariadne felt frustrated by it, not sure if he meant for the kiss on the second layer to mean something or if this was just his way of biding time until he could do a job again.

It took another kiss in her apartment to make her realize that he meant more by their conversations than she thought. Ariadne didn't let him leave with just a light kiss on the lips, though. She had weeks of frustration to burn through, and she pulled him close to give him a bone searing kiss, her tongue sliding into his mouth as her fingers tangled in his hair. He pulled her close and they had tumbled off of her couch onto the floor. Laughing, Ariadne simply held him close, reveling in the feel of him in her arms. This was real. This wasn't a dream or a fantasy, but reality.

She loved it.

She didn't notice it at first, but he never held her hand when they were walking in public. His was always holding something -- her coffee, a jacket, notebooks, a bag containing something they had to bring to the office they were using at their next job. Gradually, she noticed that when they were going to parks or museums, he never held her hand, either. He didn't lean in to kiss her or brush her hair away from her face. He was prepared with the hair ties she favored, pens and a notebook so she could sketch ideas as they came to her. He didn't touch her, though. It was odd, considering how passionate his kisses were when she was at his apartment or he was at hers. The first time they made love had been _amazing,_ all that undivided attention focused on her.

This made no sense whatsoever.

He knew everything about her, almost like he had written _The Encyclopedia of Ariadne._ He remembered nonsensical details, like how many books she kept on her nightstand that she was reading, her favorite music artists, her favorite painting at the Louvre, the way she made breakfast for the two of them and how much she liked it when he wrapped his arms around her first thing in the morning before getting out of bed to shower. She adored when he threw their clothes to the different corners of the rooms and devoured her mouth whole, when they couldn't get enough of each other. The fact that he walked around in public like a stranger made no sense, and she was starting to feel as though their relationship was something he was hiding.

Was he ashamed of her?

"Do you even like me?" Ariadne asked abruptly when they were on their way to his apartment after dinner. She stared at Arthur's impassive face; surprise had crossed his features briefly, but otherwise he looked almost as if he was wearing a mask. "Arthur?"

"Why are you asking me this?"

Ariadne stopped walking and he stopped beside her. They were outside of his building, but she wasn't willing to go up with him unless she was certain he wanted her to be there. Or that she wanted to be there. "You don't touch me in public, Arthur. Are you ashamed of me? Is it that you don't want people to know you're with me?"

His eyes widened a fraction and he looked at her in surprise. "How could you _think_ that, Ariadne? You're the only one I want to be with."

She reached for him and watched him shy away from her touch. "That's why," she said evenly, even though there was a distinct pain in the middle of her chest. She bit down hard on the inside of her cheek to keep from bursting into tears. She would _not_ be one of those silly kinds of girls that got giddy or emotional about a guy. She refused to be like that.

"Can we please talk about this in private?" Arthur asked, strain in his voice. "Please?" he asked again when Ariadne shook her head and started to step back. It was a split second's hesitation that made her complete the step, but then he reached out and grasped her wrist tightly. She could feel a tremor in his touch, a slight vibration running through his arm. It felt almost as if he was tightly wound, as if he would fly apart if she only knew where to release the pressure. _"Please,_ Ariadne. Let me explain."

 _Does he even love me?_ she thought as he led her inside the building. They were silent in the elevator, but he didn't let go of her wrist, not for a moment. It was almost as if he was afraid she would run away if he let go of her.

His apartment was immaculate. She teased him about being anal retentive or organized to the point of having OCD, but Arthur had only laughed at her and said that cleaning helped him think sometimes, and mindless activity could get his mind moving in different directions at once. So he tended to clean his apartment or go running if it was already clean. Those habits were holdovers from his former military days. They had drilled order and discipline into him, to the point where it almost seemed like second nature. Being so organized wasn't a necessity, and he wasn't tied to useless rituals or routines.

She used to love how she could ruffle his hair or undo his clothes, how she was almost like a mini hurricane in the midst of his order, a little ball of chaos in his life. He had always laughed and drew her close, kissing her breathless. Now she wondered if she had imagined the whole thing.

Arthur's eyes tracked her when she collapsed down onto his couch in a graceless heap. He knelt in front of her, looking up at her face with an earnest expression. "Ariadne," he began, voice soft and almost pleading. "Look at me. Please."

If she looked at him, she would start crying. Her heart would break, because she _loved_ him, more than she ever meant to, and he didn't care about her the same way. It hurt to feel that, to know that with absolute certainty, and she didn't want to give him that much more power over her.

But she looked at him anyway. She was never very good about doing the safe thing.

"I love you," he said, everything in him exuding truth and desperation. He touched her knees gently, and she could shake him off if she wanted to. "You're important to me." He touched her hand, then grasped it when she didn't move away or withdraw from his touch. "I'm not all that demonstrative, I know that. I didn't think that it would come to this. I thought you knew how important you are." He stroked the back of her hand with his thumb; his touch was gentle but she could still feel the tension inside of him.

"Then why can't you do this anywhere else?" she asked, her voice breaking as she lifted her hand. "Or can you only love me behind closed doors?"

"This isn't for anyone else to see," he said, looking at her intently. "This isn't about proving things to other people, about putting on a show. That's being desperate. That's a last ditch effort to save a dying relationship."

He believed that, Ariadne suddenly realized. He absolutely believed that.

"So what is it?" Ariadne asked. "You only want something you can keep secret? Something neat and convenient?"

There was a flare of anger in his eyes, his expression tightening. "This isn't a secret, Ariadne. You're _not_ neat. You're _not_ convenient. You drive me _crazy,_ and I can't think straight next to you." He grasped her face in both of his hands. "Touching you is private. It's between us, it's a gift you give me. I would never cheapen that."

"You don't get it, Arthur," Ariadne said, shaking her head. "This makes me feel cheap. You're hiding me. You're keeping this locked up like a dirty little secret. Like you're ashamed of me."

"No," he said, shaking his head and looking at her fiercely. "Never." His look at her was intense, and she could drown in his eyes. "I would never put you on display like that. It's ugly and desperate, it's saying you can't trust what we have. I would never do that to you."

Ariadne suddenly wondered who had broken his heart, who had twisted things so that he couldn't show romantic feelings openly. He wasn't wooden at all, especially not to someone that knew him well. He had rushed to her side immediately that first time they met in Paris. He had been concerned about her welfare, had been concerned about Cobb. He was willing to overlook serious flaws for the sake of loyalty, poured himself into his work and bent over backwards for whatever team he was working with. On this, however, he seemed unwilling to budge.

She wanted to kill her, whoever she was.

"Maybe I want to be on display," she said, challenging him as she pulled herself out of his grasp. "Maybe I want to announce to the world that I'm with you. That other people should look and be envious that we're together. That I thought we were happy."

"Thought?" he choked, leaning back and looking at her in horror.

"Maybe you think you love me," Ariadne continued as if he hadn't spoken, tears in her eyes and her voice thickening with pain. "Maybe you can tell yourself that, I don't know. But do you like me? As a person? Do you even know what makes me happy? You couldn't tell this hurt me."

He shot to his feet and his hands were tight and desperate on her shoulders. "You take three sugars and cream in your coffee, and it always has to be the high end kind of bean, freshly ground. None of that processed crap. Your library books are due next week and I was going to drop them off tomorrow on my way to meeting a contact about a job. You always get the last truffle in the box, even if you'd already had half of it, and I always get macaroons for you when you're here even if I can't stand them. Your lavender bubble bath is in my bathroom and you already have an entire drawer in my dresser for your clothes. Half of my books are in your apartment because you wanted to read them, and we watch movies at your place because you like lounging on your own couch better than mine. I pick up things from that awful Chinese food place because you like their sweet and sour pork, even if the one closer to my apartment makes better sauce. I don't let you drink more than three glasses of wine with dinner because you hate feeling like you've lost control, and I took you dancing on your birthday even though I couldn't stand the thought of people looking at us like that."

Ariadne stared at him through her tears, not understanding what he was saying. "What?"

"I hate it. I hate when people stare at us. You don't know what they're thinking about you, what they're planning to do to you. It can't happen. I won't let it happen. This is more than hand holding on a sidewalk. This is more than me pawing you in public." His gaze was intense, eyes boring into hers as his strained voice seemed to finally resonate with her. "I love you, Ariadne. _I love you._ You're the only thing that's important to me. I'd do anything to keep you safe. _You're the only thing that I love."_

Her mouth opened and shut, and she felt tears spilling over onto her cheeks. "But in public you make me feel like you can't stand me," she said in a small, pained voice. "Like you'd rather be anywhere else but next to me."

"No." His voice was fierce, and then his mouth crashed down onto hers. "God, no," he moaned against her mouth. A hand tangled into her hair, keeping her close as she grasped his shoulders for balance. "No one stares at you that way. No one's looking," he said between kisses on her mouth and jaw. "You're safe, just between us."

It felt almost as if she was being devoured whole, as if everything he couldn't say was in his kiss and fevered touches. And maybe they were. He spoke more in gesture and inflection, in the way his eyes shone when she entered a room. Ariadne tucked her chin down on top of his head when he kissed her neck and threaded her fingers through his hair. "I'm not a doll to lock up and keep safe. I can take care of myself."

There was uncertainty in his eyes when he pulled back to look at her. It wasn't doubt in her skills, she was sure. It was doubt in _himself,_ that he could trust his own reactions when next to her. She could see that now. "Ariadne..."

"If someone stares at us, I don't care." Her lips quirked up. "Isn't that how it all started anyway? Someone staring at us in a dream hotel?" She touched his lips gently. "It was worth a shot then. Isn't it worth a shot now?"

Arthur's mouth crashed down over hers again. "Yes," he moaned against her mouth. "I can try," he said between kisses. "For you."

"And I can try not to be mad if you can't," Ariadne promised as she kissed him back.

"I love you so much," Arthur said, voice heavy with need as he layered kisses over her face and jaw. He slid his hands down the sides of her neck to her shoulders and felt her shiver in his hands when his tongue traced lines down the hollow of her throat. "I can't even say how much," he murmured, his voice raw with emotion.

"So you keep it locked up inside?"

"Nowhere's safer," he said quietly, his hands at the hem of her shirt. He drew it up slowly, so that she could stop him if she wanted to. His eyes were locked on hers, and she closed her hands on his. "Ariadne?"

"If you can't say," Ariadne gasped, arching into his touch, "then show me how much you love me. Show me, Arthur," she moaned, letting a hand slide across his shoulders. "I can't read your mind."

Arthur lifted his head and looked at her, eyes smoldering. "I love you," he said, moving up to kiss her breathless. "I love you, Ariadne. I love you."

"I love you, too," she said, the words more like an exhalation. It felt as if this was part of her now, part of who she was. She was an architect in the dream share world as well as the real world and she loved Arthur. Those things defined her as much as her petite frame and brown hair. "That's why it hurt so much when I thought you didn't love me back."

His mouth was trailing along her collarbone, his hands ghosting across her stomach. "Words are weapons sometimes," he said softly. "And sometimes even gestures like taking someone's hand in public can be, too."

Ariadne moved to shove Arthur onto his back. Hands on his shoulders, she straddled his waist and leaned over him to kiss him. "I'm a big girl, Arthur. I can take it." Her lips quirked into a smile. "It'll go faster if you take off your clothes while I take off mine."

His grin was blinding and tinged with relief. She didn't even look at where she threw her clothes, or where Arthur tossed his. All she cared about was the press of her bare skin against his, their mouths and tongues together. He backed her toward the couch, but they missed and crashed onto the floor. The breath wooshed out of Ariadne's lungs, but it didn't matter. Arthur's mouth along her collarbone and his fingers on the skin of her breasts stole whatever breath was left. She ran her hands along his arms and shoulders, feeling the tension locked inside him begin to ease. He was nearly shaking above her, lips reverent as they moved to take a breast between them. Running her fingertips across his bare back, she gasped as he ran his tongue along her nipple. She could feel him smile against her, that gentle smile he always seemed to have around her when they were alone.

She was more than ready when he slipped a hand between her legs, stroking her. Ariadne pulled him up by his shoulders so that she could kiss him, sliding her tongue into his mouth. His fingers were inside her and his thumb on her clit, hitting that exact spot that sent her toes curling and hips jerking up to meet his hand. She clung to his shoulders, a moan low in her throat. She tightened around his fingers as she approached orgasm, her kisses growing sloppy and desperate against his mouth. Arthur shifted position slightly so that he was cradling her when she came with a gasp. He didn't stop stroking her, and held the kiss as long as he could. Ariadne tucked her face against his neck, kissing whatever her lips touched. She took his earlobe between her lips and tugged gently until Arthur let out a sigh of pleasure. She whimpered when Arthur curled his fingers again, and she shifted her neck so that he could kiss her pulse point more easily.

Shifting back and forth upset their balance, and they tilted until Arthur was on his back. Ariadne straddled his waist, her hands on his waist for balance. His fingers were still moving restlessly to bring her to release again. She whimpered, watching his face as she came again. She leaned down and kissed him softly, taking his face in her hands. "I want you inside me now," she whispered, her mouth hovering over his.

Arthur withdrew his fingers and guided himself into her, releasing a sigh that matched hers as she sank down over him. "Ariadne," he groaned, hands tight on her hips. She moved slow and steady at first, wanting to draw this out as long as possible. She couldn't help picking up speed after a while, grinding down hard against him. He lifted his hips slightly, making her gasp as she rocked against him. He moved his hands along her torso, stroking her slowly and deliberately before cupping her breasts in his hands.

Breath fracturing, Ariadne rocked harder against him. She made a whining, needy sound as her body tightened around him, and Arthur groaned loudly. Encouraged by that sound, Ariadne kept up the frantic pace until she shuddered over him. He urged her to continue, pulling at her hips and gasping for breath before finally arching up into her as he came.

He was quiet when she collapsed down on top of him, merely wrapping his arms around her and holding her close. He kissed her soundly when she was able to lift her head and look at him. There was no sign of any strain in her expression, though this kind of misunderstanding might happen again.

"How about we go out for dessert?" he offered, trailing his fingers down her arm.

"You mean that _wasn't_ dessert?" she teased, grinning at him. He laughed, and they got dressed. She wanted to laugh at how they both were sneaking glances at each other out of the corner of their eyes, as if they just couldn't look their fill. It was cute, and Ariadne led the way out of his apartment building. There was an ice cream parlor a few blocks away, and she already knew what she intended to order.

"Ariadne, wait," Arthur said abruptly. Ariadne stopped and looked at him, brows knit in confusion.

Hesitantly, Arthur reached out and grasped Ariadne's hand. He looked uncertain, as if he wasn't sure if this was something he should do.

Ariadne smiled at him, honored and relieved that he could do this for her. They might have this kind of conversation again, but she was starting to understand him a little better now, and he definitely understood her position better. Ariadne was suddenly very glad that Arthur was the kind of man that he was. She wouldn't want him any other way.

The End


End file.
